A high priority item for successful advocacy in special education is to have a good quality data based evaluation from a private evaluator. Such evaluations are not required in every situation; typically,however, when a parent calls an attorney or advocate it is time to seek private evaluations. These evaluations can be from a doctor, therapist, consultant or psychologist, but they all must hit the mark to be of any real value. The following are my highlights of the criteria to evaluate the evaluators.
1. Ambiguity in a report renders it near useless. I illustrate this point with an old joke that is told about a "wise" clergyman who is going to teach his student how to resolve a marital dispute. In his study the wife comes to him with the student standing near by and she explains how bad her husband has been; the clergyman strokes his beard and pronounces that she is right that her husband is bad. The husband having heard all of this in the next room bursts in and lays out his case for his wife’s failures in the marriage. The clergyman thinks about it for a moment and agrees with the husband and pronounces that the husband is right and his wife is bad. Upon the husband leaving, the student who has observed this scene unfold inquires of his teacher how did you resolve the marital dispute–you said the wife was right, and you said that the husband was right, how can they both be right. The clergyman thinks for a second and says "you know you are right too." In an effort to be "fair" some evaluators lose sight of the fact that at the end of day they need to stake out a position and stick to it.
2. Recommendations in detail are a must. I have read too many excellent reports that have few if any recommendations. The whole point of the evaluation is to recommend some course of action whether additional accommodations, new methods of teaching or a new placement. The recommendations can be definitional; so instead of calling for Wilson reading, the report can define what is needed and have an e.g. Wilson, so that there is room for discussion based upon defined characteristics.
3. Educational appropriateness is the hallmark of the report. Too often evaluators forget that they are not writing to insurance companies on the basis of medical necessity. The evaluation is about educational necessity and the elements required for FAPE. Remind the evaluator that words like best or optimal are not the legal standard; reports that include this language do no good and can do great harm to your cause.
4. Evaluators must stand by their report. This is a variation on point number one above. The evaluator must be willing to fight for his or her position at the meeting and at hearing. Determine that point from the start, and make sure that the legal department from the hospital or clinic will not bar testimony. I have had some local hospital’s legal departments, who have barred staff from even testifying that services were rendered during certain dates.
5. School-based experience is invaluable. School district’s attorneys will frequently attempt to discredit your evaluator and his or her report on the basis that the report is strictly clinical, with no application to the classroom. Related to this point is that the evaluator should make contact (or in writing attempt to make contact) with the school personnel, if possible. This contact may come through questionnaires, direct observation, or direct conversation at meetings or in the classroom. This latter point is critical to show that there was no prejudgment, and the report is grounded in the facts as they exist in the classroom not assumptions.
6. Dating the report is important. I have had reports that were not dated and this can be critical when setting out chronology at a hearing.
7. Determine if the school is using age-based or grade-based norms. Many tests have two sets of norms age and grade. If your private evaluator is going to make comparisons over time and argue for regression make sure that your evaluator and the school’s evaluator are using the same set of norms. If you do not know, have the private evaluation expressed in terms of both sets of data and see if there is a material difference.
8. Test protocols must be maintained. These are the answer sheets and raw data. If later there is a questions as to scoring, or the basis for the data, these records will be critically important. I have seen too many schools destroy these records which in my reading of the law are student records and must not be destroyed.
9. Test publisher’s guidelines should be followed, and to the extent not followed, the report needs to state that fact specifically and the data therefore can not be normed. I have seen school psychologists fail on this basis frequently. Parents need to inquire that the data was produced in accord with publisher guidelines, so there will be no question as to the validity of the data presented.
10. Standard scores are the statistically significant scores not grade equivalences, and only to a lesser degree percentiles. The evaluation must reflect standard scores (SS) and insist that the school’s reports do the same so apple-apple comparisons can be made. If the school’s report is missing this information, see if your evaluator can back into the standard score from the data presented.
11. As with any service do not hesitate to ask for references, resume and sample reports with names deleted of children similar to yours. If the report is so dense and unreadable that is not a good sign. If you can not make any sense of poorly presented data without clear narration, chances are a hearing officer (or for that matter school personnel) will not understand it either. Clear writing usually translates to clear oral presentation. Smart and confident evaluators can take hard concepts and put them into language that the average lay person can understand. Dense prose does not equal intelligence.
12. Conflicts of interest must be discussed. Does the evaluator do a lot of work for the district and therefore will not be objective, or will be reluctant to fight.
13. Verify expertise and credentials. There are some psychologists that do very well with children with learning disabilities, but not so well with a children who have behavioral issues. There is a local psychologist who permits parents to believe that he is a PhD. neuropsychologist because he works in the department of neuropsychology. He signs his name on the report to obscure that he has a M.A. If you are paying for a credential then make sure you are getting it.
14. Reports need to be reduced to writing. Oral reports may be necessary for expedited hearings but later the findings need to be put in a written report.
15. If the big name is a big pain think long and hard if you want him or her. If so, make plans for the evaluation in plenty of time, as there can be as long as a one year wait, and again verify they he or she will be able to attend meetings or hearings. Also verify that the big name is actually doing the testing. If he or she delegates the information gathering and testing to a student or a subordinate, the big name will have much less credibility at hearing, since someone else did the actual testing; they may even be barred from testifying as they do not have direct expertise regarding your child.